Oldbaldguy

Well, that's embarrassing. Of course it was a Douglas product -- I had a print of one of RG Smith's paintings of it on my wall for decades. Old fart brain fart. I am suitably chastised and will retire muttering to myself.

Much has been said about how the top of the fuselage of this model is too rounded. As I sit here looking at my 1/48 PBJ, I wonder how closely the shape of the fuselage center section of the Invader mirrors the shape of the B-25 center section? Both are products of North American Aviation after all and, to me, they are more similar than not. If it's pretty close, especially along the top, then that may open an avenue for some creative type to come up with an easy/easier correction to the Invader kit, assuming the extant 1/32 B-25 kit is at all accurate.

I can remember as a lad hearing the North American tech rep who lived across the street chortle about how the A-3 was a dull and ponderous dinosaur bound for inevitable extinction compared to the Vigilante which was at the time the last word in sleek and cool. As unworldly as I was then, I still had doubts because, even after squadrons converted from A-3s to A-5s, the suddenly redundant Whales didn't disappear, they just moved a little farther down the ramp and I would see them flying every day. In the end, the Viggie had two jobs, only one of which it actually did. But the Whale was another matter altogether. I'm not sure I can count up on the fingers of both hands all the various missions it did with minimum fuss and bother, some long after the Viggies were either sitting on a stick or were left to return to the earth. This most ambitious model is a perfect example. It's an ERA-3B; that's half the English alphabet's worth of missions added to an airplane that started out as a humble A. So much for sleek and cool.

Early allied Mustang operating from forward bases in combat, correct? Absent any definitive explanation, seems to me most likely that the goo on the wings is a local attempt at an anti-ablative coating applied to keep rocks and boulders picked up by that big prop during ground ops and take off from beating the crap out of the aluminum skin of leading edge of the wing and horizontal stab. Note that it goes from the wing root out to the landing gear where it appears to stop. This area is exposed to constant prop blast and is the least aerodynamically sensitive part of the wing in most cases. The rest of the leading edge is likely not coated with this stuff because, if it were, it would be like trying to fly with a load of ice all the time; no sane pilot would do that. Whatever the reason for it, it looks pretty permanent and was painted to match the airplane.

Clear. Only Navy jet I can think of with tinted canopies was the EA-6B. Of course, there are exceptions to every rule, especially in the Navy, but it is safe to say that Bugs' clear parts are clear.

Looking at the first Skyraider photo in this thread whilst enjoying my morning coffee, I noticed some interesting little factoids: The nearest airplane has bolt-on armor plate and a black anti-glare panel, likely making it an AD-4NA. More significantly, there is no metal canopy bow at the front of the canopy - just a simple joggle in the plexiglass - meaning all of us in our thousands who have ever built a Skyraider kit and painted that part of the canopy GSB, light gull gray or OD have been wrong. Seems like I knew this but always painted it anyway; no idea why. There are a staggering number of mission zaps on the next closest airplane and one of the airplanes with folded wings in the background has assymetrical markings on its vertical stab. Just goes to show, there's always something.

This might or might not be a good time to point out that, although ERA-3s may never have flown from carriers, they were still tactical airplanes and, unless you know something I don't, held to the Navy policy of aircrew parachutes remaining in the airplane and not shuttled back and forth between flights. You might want to check on that because it appears the seats you've printed have cushions rather than parachute packs in the seat backs.

Seems like I always arrive late to these parties.... As far as traditional aircraft instruments go, 99% mount either to the front of the panel or to the rear of the panel, depending on their function, accessories, manufacture, available room, etc. The faces of instruments mounted from the rear are usually flush or nearly flush with the panel. If your 17 year old mechanic were to paint the entire case of a rear mounted instrument, you would see color only on the bezel and it would look all neat and tidy. Of course, it he painted the case of a front mounted instrument, you see the whole thing in living color, warts and all. In the case of the Mosquito panel photo above, the blue gauges are indeed most likely coolant temp gauges -- blue=water -- one per liquid-cooled engine. The four yellow gauges almost certainly have to do with oil -- Yellow=oil in most cases -- and are oil pressure and oil temp gauges, one pair per side. It's hard to tell from the photo exactly what the red gauges are for. I'd guess something to do with fuel, such as fuel mixture, fuel pressure or fuel flow per engine, but I could be wrong. The mixture controls on all my airplanes were always red, throttles were black and prop controls were blue, but we're talking about 75 year old SOP in the case of a Mosquito and it was Brit logic to boot, so..... I also should point out that I've seen photos of Brit radio gear from the same era with red, yellow and green markings on their fronts and I'm pretty sure none had coolant, oil or gas pumping through them, which means I could be completely wrong.

A-26 afficianados would do well to go to Ebay Motors Aircraft and check out item #1435844211305. It's a gun-nosed A-26 project that is pretty unmolested from the day it left service with the Air National Guard. The listing includes a number of pretty decent photos of the fuselage, components and parts, including shots of the interior showing accurate colors, placards and such. This airplane is a rare unrestored project that has been pretty much untouched for years, so what you see is a time capsule from the days it was an operational bomber. Well worth a look. Don't know if you can download the photos or not. Two other good sources for detail photos of restored warbirds and warbird projects - some of which are pretty rare -- are Courtesy Aircraft and Platinum Fighters. I recommend their sites highly for detailed walk-around type photos of both flying aircraft and restoration projects. Bear in mind, however, that, unlike the A-26 on Ebay, the flying aircraft on these two sites have been through a number of owners and have been "restored" at least once, so any claims of historical accuracy should be taken with a grain of salt.

You know, if you ignore the long scoop on top, the cowlings in this kit look a lot like the ones on the recent B-26K Counter Invader restoration but only sort of like all the other B-26 cowls. So ya gotta wonder if.....

Oh yeah, the faults are just glaring....

Looks like the fire melted the back of the radome into a big blob. Good shot of the cockpit and panel. Amazing what the kids from this era did every day and acted like it was business as usual. No sims or reset buttons allowed.

The Collings bombers on tour? I understand the need to generate paying pax to keep these airplanes flying but, having been a skydiver back in my college days, I can tell you that I'd never let one anywhere near any of my airplanes.

This is another one of those "How'd the hell did he do that??" moments.

North American Aviation tried desperately to sell their Vigilante to the RAAF as a Canberra replacement. It had range, payload, sophistication, mission flexibility and was originally designed to be an interdiction bomber, just like the Vaark. It also had a whopping big price per airplane and may not have been quite as good down low, even though it had that capability. I never did hear for sure why GD won the contract -- not sure the Viggie was any more complex or more of a maintenance hog -- but I suspect politics played a big role in the decision.

Wait, what? You're back in the hobby and you did this with a brush???? I can't build or paint like this and I never left!!

Sorry to come in so late on this but.... The whole panel line argument is the same as trying to talk dispassionately about who should be president or whether Normal Rockwell was a better painter than Picasso -- there is no real right answer; everything boils down to your personal point of view. Just because construction drawings or three-views show panel lines doesn't mean you can actually see them on the real thing. As for photos, cameras record reflected light, which changes by the minute and is reliable only for that instant in time. Just because you can see some obscure detail in a close-up photo doesn't mean you should be able to see it on a 1/32 model no matter how close to your eye you hold it because you can never recreate the same visual perspective -- there is not such thing as a 1/32 human eyeball. In the scales most of us build, prominent panel lines and fasteners are pure fiction. If you don't believe me, try this simple test if you are brave enough: If you have a model of an airplane that is currently at an airport, display or museum, take it there and hold it out at arm's length then walk back until your super realistic model and the real airplane are the same relative size, then see for yourself how many of the panel lines and other "details" you spent hours sweating over are actually visible on the real thing. You'll be surprised. Personally, I don't care one way or another about panel lines and rivets as long as when I see your model I can say to myself, "How the hell did he do that??" It's that Picasso/Rockwell thing.

I have a low opinion of the many one- or two-airplane "flying museums" out there these days because so many are always short of money and often operate literally on a wing and a prayer. There is one at my airport and I had an opportunity to get checked out in one of their airplanes because they needed ferry pilots to take it to airshows and such -- my time, their gas, etc. But it was easy to decline this choice gig after nosing around their hangar a bit. The things I saw while rummaging through their "spares" and while watching their volunteer maintainers bang away on their airplanes made me run the other way and never look back. But I always thought the Collings Foundation was well funded and well managed because their airplanes always looked great whenever I saw them. Seems to me their bean counters would have to be aware of the enormous liability issues associated with selling rides in these old maintenance hogs and would have kept them focused on dotting I's and crossing T's, so you gotta wonder if maybe this was a 909 specific thing perpetrated by a tired, maybe complacent and aging flight crew who were used to making do to keep their airplane in the air when far from home. I think the aircraft commander for 909 was highest time B-17 pilot on the planet; he was 75. While touring FiFi not long ago, I had the chance to talk to the A/C and was surprised to learn that he was 74. I'm sure both these guys had seen everything there is to see while on tour. Now, I'm not dumping on old farts because I am one, but decades of experience and a high level of familiarity with a specific airplane can breed complacency to the point that you might one day ask it to do the impossible because it has never let you down before. Whatever the reason, I think the Collings Foundation is toast and that we're soon going to see their entire collection on the auction block. Too bad, because it didn't have to be that way.

While drifting off to sleep last night I was noodling over some things I don't know. I know, for example, that the Navy's A-3 Skywarrior had a hatch and passage way between the cockpit and the bomb bay so that the bombadier/navigator could access the nuclear weapon and arm/disarm it in flight per nuke protocols at the time, but I don't know if there were lights in the bomb bay to aid him in doing this. I can't imagine trying to arm a nuke by feel in the dark or maybe with just a flashlight. Then I wondered if this was a Navy/Douglas thing or if some of the other early bombers in the Navy and Air Force had the same provision. Was it the same in North American's AJ Savage or the B-50 or maybe the B-45 or B-47 or any of the big Brit bombers of that era? Crawling around in the cramped innards of a warplane in flight in order to open a panel on a live nuclear device to enter some sort of secret code or turn a gizmo to wake it up seems very Hollywoodish to me, but the rules of engagement were different back then. And no, I've never bothered to notice if there are lights in the bomb bays I've seen the insides of, mainly because it never occurred to me. So, well-lit bomb bays: does anyone know for certain, have ideas, been there/done that?

My dad stayed in the Navy after WW2 and was assigned for a couple of years to a P2V squadron based at Roosevelt Roads Naval Air Station, Puerto Rico. He was a Aviation Ordnanceman and aircrewman. As an AO1, he was responsible for the care and feeding of anything on the airplane that had to do with raining fire and steel on the enemy. His unit, either VP-3 or VP-5 - I forget which - flew routine coastal patrols from PR up the East Coast to the Navy base at Argentia, Newfoudland, where they would land, RON, and then fly back. I can't imagine a more boring, groaner of a mission. Since we were technically at peace at that time, there was little for him to do during these very long missions, so he became the chief cook and bottle washer along with other duties as assigned. Roast beef was apparently a staple on these flights as was lots of coffee, pies, etc - remember that the Navy ALWAYS ate well - and the airplane had a full galley. He told me he was never able to boil water, however, because they usually cruised too high to get it to boil. According to him, garbage went over the side with little regard to who or what was below them at the time and I always wondered what it would be like to be smacked by a frozen potato from nowhere traveling at terminal velocity . If you've never been in one, a Neptune is big but not particularly commodious. The fuselage is divided roughly in half by a massive wing carry-through/fuel tank that takes up most of the available space in the middle of the airplane. If you want to go from one compartment to the other, you have to climb/slide over it. Most of the rest of the space was filled with old school tube avionics with women's names like Jazabel and Juliet, radar scopes and such, so there was little walking-around room. The version of the Neptune he flew in was an early one with a solid nose with fixed guns, a bomb bay and eight pylons under each wing. I don't think it carried much in the way of sonar like later versions did. No jet engines or tip tanks, but it could use JATO if necessary. Overall sea blue with minimal markings. I have a photo somewhere of him in a poopy suit (immersion suit) either for training or in prep for a long over water patrol up north and he looks for all the world like Fozzie Bear of the Muppets.

Next extra detailing, then the diesel engine. Did he actually say that?? Extra detailing???

Okay, I gotta ask. Will you ever try to float this thing? If it were me, after all this mind boggling work, I'd never be able to sleep until I knew if it floats.

I googled "A-10 fire bomber" a bit ago and got a couple of hits. Seems the matter resurfaced again around 2014 or so but was not met with much enthusiasm the second time around, either. I no longer have the concept drawing but still still remember it very clearly. It was a left side profile; no gun, racks or pylons. The tank was depicted as a pretty good sized bath tub shaped thing attached to the belly of the airplane and looked a lot like the retardant tanks carried by Tigercats and B-25s back in the day. The airplane was overall white with red and black trim, much like the paint job on the Aero-Union SP-2 tankers: red nose section slanting from behind the canopy forward with black trim, red vertical stabs, red wing tips and white engine nacelles with USFS in black letters on the cowling. I guess they were thinking the US Forest Service would end up with them. It would be a fun what-if model project but probably would have been a real POS in real life.

For all you guys - and you know who you are - who get weak in the knees at the prospect of converting something like an A-26 or S-2 kit into a model of a fire retardant bomber, you might feel a tingle run up your leg to learn that the US Air Force actually explored turning the A-10 into a water bomber. Back in the day when I worked in The Building, Air Force planners were looking for a new home for the A-10. It was no secret that then Chief of Staff Gen. Tony McPeak, a hard-core fighter pilot if there ever was one, was not much enamored with Hawgs and wanted them gone from his Air Force. Be advised this is only my opinion, but I suspect it was because A-10s looked less like a shiny lawn dart than something a kid would bang together out of a couple of boards. Whatever the reason, the Fighter Mafia was looking to move the airplanes as far away as possible from Air Force ramps. One solution was to give the A-10 fleet to the Army to use as it saw fit, but the Army guys couldn't fly anything without a collective, so that was out. The Navy just laughed at the offer, mostly because Tom Cruise would not be caught dead in one, even though there is plenty of room in an A-10's copious cockpit for a Naval Aviator's enormous wristwatch. Another option that actually gained a little traction was to give them to the Department of The Interior to convert into fire retardant bombers to fight forest fires. This study produced concept drawings of an A-10 with a big retardant tank underneath, all decked out in the traditional red and white fire bomber paint scheme. I know the plan went this far because I saved one of the drawings from the defunct Fighter Bar on the A Ring after McPeak closed it and it hung over my desk for a couple of years. Efforts to be rid of Warthogs became moot when the first Gulf War kicked off and the Army guys on the ground immediately began extolling the airplane's many virtues to anyone who would listen. Nowadays, the A-10 has a fiercely loyal following and an almost mythic reputation. No matter that the pointy end is in back or that it is prone to bird strikes from the rear, it certainly outlasted Tony McPeak in this man's Air Force and has seen more than its share of combat, dropping pretty much anything that can be hung under it except water and has never, as far as I know, been painted red and white.

Apparently the US Air Force considers tankers to be important enough that they are now considering going to civilian operators such as Omega and whoever else pops up to fill mostly stateside tanker support requirements, freeing up operational birds for other missions down-range and such. The Air Force in this last budget cycle tried to divest itself of some of its older and tireder KC-10s and KC-135s earlier than planned in anticipation of the KC-46 in order to free up money for other things and is now scrambling to find funds to "buy back" a couple of dozen of these airplanes to keep up with operational needs. So, we remain in SNAFU mode. I'm still trying to understand how contracting operational capacity from the civilian sector can be cost effective in the long run while we continue to pay Boeing for KC-46s that spend most of their time sitting on the ramp non-op. Seems to me it would be smarter and cheaper to tell Boeing to fix it or DOD stops writing checks for airplanes that don't work. Of course, the 737 Max debacle hasn't seemed to phase them much either, so maybe they think they are too big to fail.